


We'll Find Sam, But First...

by Name_Pending



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Castiel Needs a Hug, Castiel Takes Care of Dean Winchester, Crying Dean Winchester, Dean Needs A Hug, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Hurt Dean Winchester, Implied Castiel/Dean Winchester, Possessed Sam Winchester, Protective Castiel, Season/Series 09
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-15
Updated: 2018-02-15
Packaged: 2019-03-19 03:56:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,868
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13696386
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Name_Pending/pseuds/Name_Pending
Summary: After Kevin’s death and Gadreel’s departure, Dean feels completely alone. He wants to call Cas but he can’t, not after he turned him away from the bunker. Cas probably hates him now.That doesn’t mean Dean’s stopped needing him.





	We'll Find Sam, But First...

**Author's Note:**

> This is set right after Season 9 Episode 9, and is a bit of an AU for how the next episode starts. Begins right after Gadreel kills Kevin and leaves the bunker.

It took him some time before he managed to pull himself up from the ground to deal with Kevin’s body. His vision was still blurry even after the tears stopped falling, and he rubbed angrily at this swollen eyes, although he could hardly keep them open as he looked at the limp body in front of him.

Angel kills never made for pretty corpses, with their burned out eye sockets and bloodstains on their cheeks. Kevin was no different, but it felt different to look at him. Maybe it was just the fact that this was someone Dean considered to be family; he knew from experience that it was always worse watching the people you loved die than it was to see the lives of strangers end.

Or maybe it was because Kevin was just a kid. A young, innocent kid who never chose this life but was dragged into it anyway, kicking and screaming. Kevin was no hunter and had never wanted to be a prophet. It burned to know that he was dead now, with no chance of ever going back to a real life.

He should get a real funeral, Dean knew, but who would come? He could hardly just announce the kid’s death to the local papers. No, he would burn the body; a hunter’s funeral was the best he could offer. It was the sort of funeral his family always had, and Kevin was family.

 

/

 

After the funeral, Dean raged in the bunker. Alcohol and grief and helplessness mixed together and blurred his senses, and soon he could no longer remember why exactly he had trashed his home. All he knew was that Kevin was dead and Sam had been taken by an angel and Cas was …

Cas was gone.

He was out there, somewhere, but Dean didn’t know where. He could call and ask, but would Cas even answer? Dean pictured the angel - _former angel_ , his conscience reminded him - taking his phone from his pocket, seeing who was calling, and ignoring it. It was a painful picture, though not so painful as the one in which he imagined Cas being unable to answer, imagined him being hurt badly or worse.

 _If he’s hurt or dead, it’s my fault_ , Dean thought. _I’m the one who told him to leave._

And what good had that done him?

He hadn’t wanted Cas to leave, he’d been happy to finally have his best friend in the bunker. He wanted his family to all be together under one roof, and there was a space missing in his new home that he knew would only be filled when Cas joined them.

He wouldn’t force the angel to come back, though. He couldn’t blame him for not wanting to, after what Dean had done to him.

 _He was human and scared and alone, and I kicked him out._ The thought had come to him many times since the event, but it burned now more than ever. _He probably hates me. He_ should _hate me._

The thought that he had driven his best friend away hurt more badly now than it had before. At least he had still had Sam and Kevin then. Now he had nobody, and his brother was out there somewhere with a damned murdering angel in his head, and that was Dean’s fault, too. Sam would never have agreed to being possessed by an angel, not if Dean hadn’t tricked him into it. Kevin’s murder was on his hands as much as Ezekiel’s, he knew.

He collapsed onto the floor of the bunker. He wanted to call Cas so badly right now.

He wouldn’t, though. He didn’t deserve a friend, he didn’t deserve anything good.

 

/

 

He didn’t mean to fall asleep propped up against the wall of the bunker, smashed objects all around him, but he must have. He woke with a splitting headache and no real memory of the night before beyond burning Kevin’s body.

The hangover was a bad one, the type that makes your eyes throb in your skull and your brain scream at you. On this occasion, it was also the type where the pain got to be too much and Dean was hovering somewhere between hungover and still drunk, and he reached for his phone now without thinking.

Last night thinking had made him too frightened and ashamed to call the one person he desperately needed to hear from right now, but now he refused to think as he selected the name from his call list and held his breath, listening to the ringing.

It rang three times and his heart sank - Cas wasn’t going to answer. He had probably seen Dean’s name on his phone, glared and thrown the phone across the room without even thinking to actually reject the call, he must hate Dean so much, it was his own damn fault, he had truly screwed everything up this time and…

“Hello?”

Dean’s breath caught in his throat. Cas sounded inquisitive, like he wasn’t sure who was calling. Dean smiled without really meaning to, realising that Cas had probably answered without even looking at the caller ID. He often forgot to check little things like that.

He realised that he hadn’t answered. “Hey, Cas. It’s me.” He forced his tone to be light and casual, not wanting to alarm his friend. “Just calling to check in.”

“Oh. Hello, Dean.” A pause. “I’m fine. I’ve restored my grace. Well, sort of. It’s a long story.”

“Yeah?”

“Yes. Dean?” Dean could practically hear the frown. “Are you alright?”

 _No_.

“Yeah, yeah, I’m good. Listen, buddy, I’m glad to hear about you getting your mojo back. The timing might be just right.”

“Why?”

Dean struggled for an answer. What could he say? ‘ _I lied to you and kicked you out when you needed me but I tricked my brother into letting an angel possess him and now he’s murdered Kevin and it’s all my fault and I don’t deserve you but can you come back because I need you anyway?_ ’

Yeah, that probably wouldn’t go over well. There was no way the truth was coming out like this, over the phone.

“Can you get back to the bunker, Cas?” He hoped he didn’t sound as desperate as he felt. “There’s some stuff going on that I haven’t told you about and it ... got bad.”

“What stuff?”

“Cas, can you...” He sighed, closing his eyes and curling in on himself where he lay on the floor. His voice lowered without him meaning it to. “Can you just come back?”

There was a pause on the other end of the line before his friend answered. “Of course. I’ll be there shortly. I … I don’t have my wings, so I’ll have to drive, but I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

Dean nodded, realised Cas couldn’t see him, and told him that he would see him soon.

Cas seemed to hesitate before he hung up, and Dean hated the silence that followed.

 

/

 

Hours later, he stood in the bunker facing his best friend, who looked much more like himself than he had the last time they’d been together. The new trench coat was a nice touch. Upon seeing his old friend return to the bunker, looking like himself, Dean had actually smiled. He’d lost that smile now, though.  

He had told Cas everything, and Cas had said all the right things and reassured him that he had been ‘stupid for the right reasons’. He’d said that that was all that mattered.

Only he was wrong. The reasons didn’t matter now, not to Sam or Kevin. He didn’t need placations, he needed to find his brother. He hadn’t called Cas for reassurance, he’d called him because he needed help to find Sam and take him back from Ezekiel, or whoever the hell he was.

Hadn’t he?

He really did need the angel’s help, but if he was honest - somewhere in the back of his mind - that wasn’t the only reason he’d called him. He needed to apologise properly to him as well, of course, but that wasn’t why he’d called, it was just something he had to do now that Cas was here.

He’d called because …

“Dean?” Cas prodded, shaking him out of his thoughts. “Are you alright?”

Dean smiled helplessly at his friend because this, _this_ , was _exactly_ why he had called Cas now, why he had been unable to stop himself from calling against his better judgement and knowing all the time that he didn’t deserve his friend.

He’d called because Castiel was the only person in the world right now who would think to ask that question. He’d asked it already and Dean had brushed him off like he always did, but Cas would keep asking because he knew the answer already, and he knew a lie when he heard it.

Dean had called because he wasn’t alright but he couldn’t bring himself to admit it, and Cas was the only one who might see through him.

“I’m fine” he tried again - because the answer was hard-wired into his system - smiling as best he could. It was a watery smile. “I just need to find Sam.”

Cas nodded, eyeing Dean suspiciously. “We’ll find him, Dean. Have you eaten anything?”

Dean was surprised by the question. “What?”

“I said, have you eaten?”

“Cas, who cares if I’ve...”

“I do.” He said it as if it was so obvious. “We’ll find Sam, I promise. But you’ve clearly drunk a lot of liquor in the past twenty four hours, and you need to eat.” He smiled crookedly. “I learned that much from my time as a human.”

Dean looked down. _Cas was human, and that’s on me, too. Without me, he’d never have..._

“Dean?”

He really should stop getting lost in thought when Cas was talking to him. “I’m fine, Cas. I’ll eat once we’ve found Sam and got him to kick that frickin’ angel out.”

Cas frowned at him. “I’ll listen in on angel radio and see if they’ve heard anything, Dean. I’ll make a start while you get something to eat, and then we can talk to Crowley.”

It amused Dean, at least, to know that their little plan to talk with Crowley was something Cas liked no more than he did. It didn’t help, though.

“I don’t want to eat, man. I just want to get started. Let’s go talk to Crowley.”

Dean started off in the direction of the bunker’s dungeon where the demon resided, but Cas moved faster than he did and placed a hand on Dean’s chest, halting him.

“And after we talk to him? We can’t go rushing off after Sam with you like this. You need to rest first.”

“Aw, c’mon, man. We don’t have time to...”

“Dean, the angel possessing Sam, whoever it is, has no reason to harm him. He needs Sam alive. Your brother is in no more danger than he has been for the past few weeks.” Cas’ hand slid off Dean’s chest and the hunter was surprised to find that he missed the warmth. “Go get something to eat. I’ll make a start on tracking Sam down and then we’ll speak with Crowley.”

Dean shook his head, tempted to force his way past his friend but hesitant to hurt him; he didn’t know how strong Cas was right now with his borrowed grace.

“I need to find him, Cas” the hunter whispered, cringing at how watery and desperate he sounded. “If anything happens to Sam, it’s my fault. I already got Kevin killed, I kicked you out of here, I … I can’t lose Sam, too.”

“You _won’t_ lose him, Dean. I promise.” Cas paused for a second. “You haven’t lost me, either.”

“Yeah, and why the hell not?” Dean snapped. “You got every right to hate me, man. I kicked you out with _nothing_!”

“I don’t hate you, Dean. And I understand your reasoning.” Cas seemed to hesitate, but then he continued in a soft voice. “I didn’t, before. I thought that … without my powers, I thought that I was no longer of any use to you.”

“Cas, no, that was never...”

“I know that now” Cas smiled. “I understand, Dean. You had to put Sam’s life first, I don’t blame you for that.”

“Yeah?” Dean huffed a sarcastic laugh. “Well maybe you should. Doesn’t matter about Sam. I should’ve at least kept an eye on you. Could’ve kept you close, found you a place near here. I owed you an explanation.”

“And you’ve given me one” Cas said simply, like that made everything okay.

 _It’s not good enough, Cas_ , Dean thought miserably, and he dragged a hand down his face tiredly.

He would have said something more, but his treacherous stomach growled in displeasure at being left void of anything but beer for so long.

“Dean, go get something to eat. I’ll make a start on finding your brother.”

Dean wanted to argue more, needed to find Sam, but Cas was right. He was no good like this. He needed to calm down and eat something first, and then he would find his brother and kick that goddamned angel out of his head.

He nodded his consent, and allowed Cas to take him by the arm and lead him to the bunker’s kitchen. There he grabbed the first thing he could find in the fridge - cold pizza, three days old, probably should’ve been thrown out by now but oh well - and shoved it down his throat, because he wasn’t about to waste time on cooking.

Cas had left him for a couple of minutes and returned with Sam’s laptop and a thick book; Dean didn’t know what he was planning to do with them and he didn’t ask. He trusted Cas to know what he was doing in tracking down Sam.

He trusted Cas full stop. Why did he let Ezekiel get in the way of that?

“I’m so sorry, Cas” he whispered, and the angel looked up at him in surprise. “I should’ve taken better care of you. I’m sorry.”

“Dean, it’s alright. I know you would have helped me if you’d been able to” Cas replied gently.

Dean drew in a watery gasp and looked away, unable to hold the angel’s understanding gaze. Cas shouldn’t understand, shouldn’t be so nice to him. He didn’t deserve it.

“Stop that.”

“Huh?”

“Stop thinking about it, Dean.” Cas closed the lid of the laptop and shoved it away, turning to face the hunter. “You were taking care of Sam. That’s worth everything. I don’t want you to feel guilty for that.”

“I know. Still … I’m still sorry, Cas.”

“I know you are, but it’s okay.” Cas reached out and grabbed Dean’s hand. “I forgive you, Dean.”

Dean nodded and his bottom lip wobbled a little, and he turned his face away before Cas could see that his eyes were tearing up. He didn’t want to put this his own damn self-pity onto Cas, the guy had enough problems without Dean adding to them.

Cas seemed to have other ideas, though.

He stood up and slowly took the two steps forward so he was right beside Dean, and there he placed one hand on the back of Dean’s neck and the other on his upper back, and he gently pulled the hunter forward so that Dean’s head was cradled against his stomach. Dean gasped a little at the contact, fully aware of the intimacy of it.

He didn’t care, though. This was Castiel, the only person left who actually gave a damn about him, besides his brother who may not care by the time he found out what Dean had done. Cas, who had every right to walk out the door and never look back, was staying. Cas should hate him, but here he was, selflessly offering the comfort that Dean didn’t deserve but craved nonetheless.

Dean leaned against the angel, wrapped both arms around his hips. His hands were placed too low on Cas’ back for the embrace to look completely friendly, but Cas didn’t seem to care. He kept one hand on the back of Dean’s head and the other moved in slow circles between his shoulder blades.

“It’s okay, Dean. We’ll find Sam and we’ll fix this. We’ll fix all of it.”

Dean knew what Cas meant. They’d get Sam back and kick out Ezekiel and take down Metatron and get the angels back to Heaven. Maybe they would do it all, but it wouldn’t be enough. It couldn’t bring Kevin back. It couldn’t change what he’d done to Sam, or to Cas.

But Dean didn’t say that because it wasn’t fair. Instead he just clung to his best friend, secure in the knowledge that he was with the only person in the world with whom he was comfortable enough to cry. He was all too aware that the tears he couldn’t hold back were wetting the material of the angel’s shirt, aware that Cas could feel the slightly shaking of his shoulders. It was okay, though, because this was _Cas_.

“You’re okay, Dean” Cas whispered. “I’m here.”

Dean just sobbed in response and clung to the angel. “Thanks, Cas.”


End file.
